Diver's relatives blast Paria's response to incident

The relatives of drowned diver Yusuf Henry did not mince words when they criticised the Paria Fuel Trading Company Ltd's response to and management of the situation in the aftermath of his death on Tuesday.

Henry's sister Afeisha Henry, his mother Nicole Greenidge and 11-year-old daughter Aliyah Henry presented their statements during a hearing of the commission of enquiry into his death on Tuesday afternoon.

Henry together with Faizal Kurban, Rishi Nagassar and Kazim Ali Jr, became trapped in a pipeline while doing maintenance works at Berth 6 of Paria's Pointe-a-Pierre facility last February. The men died and their bodies were found days later.

Henry's relatives were the last witnesses to present statements for Tuesday's hearing.

Henry's sister, in her statement, recalled in detail the afternoon she heard Henry was trapped and the challenges in receiving updates on rescue efforts for her brother and the other divers.

In her statement Henry described the initial meeting between the families and Paria officials, including general manager Mushtaq Mohammed and engineer Michael Wei, and slammed both.

"Tonnes of questions came from family members and Mr Mushtaq just kept smiling.

"Mr Wei wasn't very vocal in my opinion... but of course everyone left thereeven more annoyed than when we arrived, due to the fact that Paria officials called us: to give us what? A little bit of AC (air conditioning) and a room-temperature bottle water?

"Because little to no information was shared. I felt that they could have sent that message with a security guard."

Henry added that she was even more annoyed when a Paria representative assigned to liaise with the family on rescue efforts asked for their e-mail addresses even after having their contact numbers for updates.

"I became absolutely annoyed and responded with a very ugly message that e-mail and WhatsApp weren't that different. 'Why can't you just send the stuff here (WhatsApp)?' Which she never responded to."

During her statement Greenidge also knocked Paria's response to the incident, citing instances where she felt the company had not adequately kept families updated with information.

"My family and I left Paria's carpark at around 10.30 pm on Sunday night.

"On Monday 28 we returned to the carpark at around 10 am. By this time my family never received a direct phone call that Paria (had) changed the rescue to a recovery.

"I found it a bit disrespectful to the families, as it was, in my opinion, a wrong-sided decision to have a media release before contacting the families. However, we just waited again in the carpark."

Henry's daughter's statement was read by attorney Prakash Ramadhar.

In her address Aliyah described the ordeal of coping with her father's death.

"I will never get over this horrific death of my father. He didn't deserve that death.

"Every day I wake up it's like I'm living a nightmare that my father is no longer with me.

"I write SEA this year and I don't know how I will do it without my dad's support."